The Thermal Register · A building-science journal that also insulates · Quillhaven & the Marcher parishes · Est. 2011
Heat moves in three ways. We write about all of them, then we fix them.
The Register is a journal and a crew: hygrothermal analysis in the pages, dense-pack and air sealing in the parishes, and every job written up — blower-door before, infrared plates, achieved R-value — in the following issue. Subscribers make the best customers; customers make the best subscribers.
Issue 58 mailed this quarter · 1,900 houses tested and written up since 2011 · every achieved R-value printed, including the disappointments
The Bridge Street job missed its target by forty CFM50 and the write-up said so on page nine. Three readers changed their contracts to name test-out numbers because of it. That is the circulation we are after.
What we do
What the crew does
Walls, dense-packed & documented
Cellulose at a gauged two-point-nine to three-point-five pounds per cubic foot, density printed in your write-up beside the infrared plates of every bay. R-13 to R-15 added inside walls that had nothing, and the before-and-after door numbers to prove what the fibre plus the sealing actually bought.
Attics to R-60, with the plates
Air-sealed flat, ventilation channels preserved, wool or cellulose to R-60 over the ceiling joists — and cathedral bays dense-packed to R-38 with the vent paths photographed before and after. The write-up runs the thermal-gradient plates, so you can see the rafters stop being stripes.
Ventilation & HRVs, balanced and measured
For houses the envelope has closed: heat-recovery ventilation commissioned with an airflow report, not a promise. The Register has run a humidity column since issue 19, and it has yet to print a single apology for a balanced house.
Rates
The fee schedule, printed like the table of contents
Flat and per-square-foot prices from the current issue. Every line ends in a number the door or the gauge can check, and the write-up that follows your job is included in all of them — the journal exists on subscriptions, not on mark-up.
The survey & test-infree
Blower door, infrared plates, hygrothermal notes — the binder is yours
Air sealing dayfrom $1,380
Top plates to rim joist, foam and smoke pencil, running CFM count
Dense-pack wallsfrom $3.20 / sq ft
Per square foot of wall, density gauged and printed
Attic to R-60from $2.55 / sq ft
Sealed flat, dressed flue clearances, plates before and after
HRV fitted & commissionedfrom $4,100
Balanced with the airflow report in the write-up
The write-up in the next issueincluded
Both door numbers, the plates, the achieved values
How it goes
A written-up job
The same sequence on every job — the only variable is your project.
The first visit
Survey & test-in
The fan in the door, the camera through the rooms, the moisture meter along the sills. Out comes the binder: plates, readings, and a scope priced off what the house actually measured — never off a house like it.
The second visit
Seal, then pack
Air sealing first because fibre cannot fix a hole; then dense-pack to a gauged density and R-60 over the flat. The crew photographs every bay before the hose and after the plug, for the plates in your write-up.
The third visit
Test-out & the commissioning
The fan reads the new number against the target named in the scope; the HRV, if there is one, is balanced with the airflow report attached. Misses go back on the calendar, not under a rug — page nine has precedent.
The next issue
The write-up
Your house in print: both door numbers, the achieved R-values against specified, and what the winter bill did afterwards. Anonymous if you prefer — the numbers still count, and the subscribers still argue about them.
2025 — 2026, recent write-ups
From the plates & pages
Six figures from the last two issues. The full write-ups — scopes, plates, both door readings — are in the journal and in every customer’s binder alike.
Is the journal a gimmick to sell insulation?
It is the other way round, and the accounts would survive an audit: the Register pays for itself on subscriptions and the crew prices at cost-plus-wages, so the journal has no incentive to flatter a job and every incentive to be right about one. The issue that admitted a missed target cost us two subscribers and won us the two who changed their contracts to name test-out numbers.
What is a hygrothermal analysis and do I need one?
It is the study of heat and moisture moving together — which is what walls actually do. If your house has a damp wall, a cold corner that paints over and returns, or a proposal from someone selling one material for every assembly, you need one. The survey includes the notes; the write-up includes the argument.
Why print the achieved R-value and not just the specified?
Because specified is a promise and achieved is a fact, and the gap between them is where money and comfort disappear. Dense-pack falls short of its rating when the density does; R-60 over the flat does nothing over an unsealed ceiling. The door and the gauge close the gap, and the page numbers make it stay closed.
Do you take on houses other firms condemned?
Often — a condemned house is usually an unmeasured one. Bring the quote; the test-in will read the actual leakage and the plates will show where the heat actually leaves. The Register has published three rebuttals this year, each with the door numbers that did the arguing.
Can I subscribe without hiring the crew?
Please do — a third of the circulation has never hired anybody. Four issues a year, the accountability number on page nine, and the classified ads, which are themselves a building-science education. Subscribers who later hire get the survey moved up the calendar, which is the only perk and it is stated as such.
Reader mail
From the letters column
The five the postbag brings every quarter, answered at editorial length. Anything else, the desk answers between eight and six, Quillhaven time.
Counted since 2011
The masthead figures
We hired the crew because the journal embarrassed everyone else, and we stayed subscribers because of page nine. Our house missed its first test-out by thirty CFM50 — a rim-joist run the plates had hidden behind a duct — and the write-up printed the miss, the return visit and the final number in that order. The bedroom over the garage is a room now, not an excuse. Both door readings hang framed in the hall, facing each other.
Free survey & test-in across the Marcher parishes · subscriptions $18 a year · (555) 026-4493 · desk@thermalregister.example
Write to the desk
Hire the crew, subscribe to the issue, or send the damp corner nobody has explained — the desk answers all three, and the survey with plates and both door readings is free either way. desk@thermalregister.example